


I've Missed This

by headwonk



Series: Doctor Who [4]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Eventual Relationships, F/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-18
Updated: 2019-03-18
Packaged: 2019-11-23 16:20:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18154175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/headwonk/pseuds/headwonk
Summary: The story of how Captain Jack returned and started travelling with the Doctor, and how they fell in love all over again.





	I've Missed This

"How long have we gotta stay here, Doc?" Graham questioned from where he was positioned against the console, a folded newspaper from 1963 in hand.

The Doctor looked up from where she was quickly and easily solving a Rubiks Cube. She looked about as bored as Graham felt at that point. He knew how much she liked to be on the move, so being stuck in Cardiff on Earth, doing nothing while the TARDIS refuelled, well, he was surprised how long she'd lasted.

"A few more hours and we should be on the move again," she smiled hopefully at him, as if she wasn't sure of her own words. For all Graham knew, they could be stuck there for another day or so. "Ryan and Yaz are takin' their time, though," she mused, tossing her finished Rubiks Cube up in the air and catching it.

"They left ten minutes ago," Graham pointed out, amused.

The Doctor made a face of reluctant agreement and pocketed her toy. Instead, to distract herself from the boredom of sitting around in Cardiff, she crouched down and pulled up a panel from the floor where she usually did repairs on her ship. Graham opened up his newspaper and perched his reading glasses on the end of his nose so he could read the small font printed on the ancient papers.

The console room fell into comfortable silence, Graham reading and the Doctor half buried under the floor through the small gap where the panel had once been. The silence was only broken occasionally when a clang or mumble floated up from where the Doctor was messing with the wiring under the floor.

As Graham flipped the page, intrigued in an article from the newspaper, a knock hammered on the door. Graham looked up and took the glasses off his face.

"Blimey," he said, folding the newspaper again, "that was quick. Thought they'd be longer."

There was a vague noise of agreement from the Doctor, but it sounded like she wasn't really paying attention to him. She probably hadn't even heard the knock on the door.

"I'll get it, then," he said to himself and pushed away from the console. On his way, he pocketed his reading glasses and put the newspaper under his arm.

"Captain Jack Harkness, and who are you?" A handsome, American man in a World War II coat introduced the second he opened the door. Loud, metallic, clanging came from over with the Doctor as if she'd dropped all her tools, followed by a bumping sound and an 'ow!'. Graham turned around to see if she was okay, only to see her feet wriggling around wildly as she struggled to get out of the small hole she'd buried herself in.

"Little help?" Came her desperate request a moment later, when she'd stopped struggling. Graham turned back to the Captain outside to TARDIS who looked amused beyond end.

"Give me a mo'?" Graham requested, to which the Captain nodded, his hands on his hips and a smirk lighting up his, admittedly handsome, features. With that, Graham passed Captain Jack his newspaper and hurried over to help the Doctor.

When he reached her, he grabbed hold of her ankles and pulled until she was far enough free that she could help herself. She pushed herself out of the hole in the floor with a relieved grunt, and wiped a hand over her forehead which only resulted in her smudging black grease across it. Graham didn't get a chance to mention it before she was thanking him and clapping him on the back.

Graham merely ended up closing his mouth and nodding when she had skipped away over to the door where Captain Jack still stood, reading the newspaper with what looked like nostalgia.

"Nineteen-sixty-three," he read aloud when Graham and the Doctor went to greet him, "great year."

The Doctor took the newspaper from his hands and gave it back to Graham, who was watching Jack with confusion. He spoke about the year as if he'd lived through it, but he didn't look older than maybe thirty, or forty. Then again, Graham mused, he did knock on the TARDIS doors as if he'd known that there would be people in there, so maybe he knew the Doctor. Perhaps even travelled with her.

"Jack," the Doctor simply said in acknowledgement to the man, her hands shoved deeply in her pockets. Graham took note that she didn't look either sad or happy at the sight of Jack, just neutral.

"Doctor," Jack said with a nod of his head in return. Graham felt like he was watching something personal and ended up watching the birds outside of the TARDIS instead, if only to give them the privacy they deserved.

Suddenly, after about a minute of silence, both the Doctor and Captain Jack let out loud, joyous laughs and the latter pulled the former into a bonecrushing hug, his arms wrapping tightly around her smaller framr as if he didn't want to let go. Graham almost got wiplash at the sudden change of mood and atmosphere surrounding the two. He stared with unabashed confusion as Jack pulled away from the Doctor, holding her at arms length as he took a good look at her.

Finally, he let his arms drop from her shoulders and let out a content sigh.

"God, I've missed you," he admitted. "It's been about a decade since I've seen you. How long for you?" He asked when the Doctor pulled him inside the TARDIS and closed the doors behind him. Graham watched how Jack looked around the TARDIS interior with some sort of approval as the Doctor gave her answer.

"Oh, you know," she said dismissively, "few centuries, maybe more than that."

"That long, huh? God knows what you did without me," Jack chuckled good naturedly.

"Got into less trouble," the Doctor retorted, arms now crossed.

"Sure you did," Jack nodded with a toothy grin.

The Doctor merely shrugged innocently and turned to the console with a smile, fiddling with the controls even though the TARDIS wouldn't be moving for a while.

Sensing the conversation had come to an end, Graham coughed shortly, drawing attention back to him. He gave a short wave then pointed at Jack.

"Ain't you gonna introduce us, Doc?" Graham asked as politely as he could.

"Oh, right!" The Doctor exclaimed, seeming to come back to herself. "Sorry. Jack, this is Graham. Graham, this is Captain Jack Harkness, an old friend of my mine who used to travel with me."

"Nice to meet you," Jack said and held out a hand for Graham. The latter took it and they shook hands. "I take it you travel with the Doc, huh?"

"Yeah, me and my grandson, and his old school mate," Graham nodded and let go of Jack's hand.

Jack turned to the Doctor, "quite a big team you've got this time," he said.

"Well, what can I say?" The Doctor replied. "The more the merrier."

Jack chuckled in what Graham could tell was fondness and nostalgia, which made him wonder if anyone else had travelled with Jack and the Doctor at one point.

"So," Jack spoke up again, "where are the other two?"

"Don't start, Jack," the Doctor warned him, a spanner pointed in his direction.

"What?" Jack defended himself. "I just wanna say hello."

"That's what you always say," the Doctor retorted, making her friend chuckle.

"Alright, alright," he relented, "you got me."

"They're out getting fish and chips," the Doctor finally answered Jack's question, "should be back soon, though."

"Can't wait to meet them," Jack said with a toothy grin.

" _Jack_ ," the Doctor whined, surprising Graham. The older man was used to a lot of things concerning the Doctor, what with her being an alien. He'd learned to accept a lot when it came to her. But never, never, had he heard her whine. Complain, yes. Stutter and blush when put on the spot or when she got things wrong, quite a few times. Graham had to clench his jaw to stop himself from smirking in amusement at the Doctor's annoyed face.

Jack walked past the Doctor looking smug, and Graham didn't miss the way he ran a hand across her waist as he passed. "I'm just messing with you, Doc," he apologised, to which the Doctor nodded and focused on messing wth the TARDIS' controls.

With a raised eyebrow, Graham opened up the newspaper Jack had handed him back and got back to reading the article he'd been distracted from. Jack and the Doctor continued talking and reminiscing as Graham read, and the older man tried to mind his own business, but it was hard when the pair spoke to each other in a way that sounded like they could break out into an argument at any moment, yet also like they were the best of friends and didn't want to be away from each other for more than five minutes. Whatever their relationship was, it confused Graham beyond end.

\--

Laughing at a joke Yaz had made a few seconds before, Ryan opened the TARDIS door and held it open for her to step in first. She thanked him around her own laughter and entered the TARDIS with him following after. The sight they were met with wasn't one they were prepared for when they both turned around.

Graham was slouched on the floor with his head in his hands as if he had a headache and was trying desperately to will it away. The Doctor was stood with long wires and bits and bobs on her hands, and was arguing with some man in suspenders and a World War II coat. The man seemed to be trying to tell her the function of whatever was in his arms, while the Doctor was also trying to tell him how something worked. Whatever it was, neither of them seemed to agree with the other.

"No!" The Doctor was viciously exclaiming, waving one large wire in the man's face. "This wire goes here! And this one goes there! We don't need that wire!" She continued, plugging in the wires she was mentioning and tossing the man's wire as far away on the floor as she could.

The man picked up the wire she'd thrown away and brought it back over to her. "Yes, we do. Without it, the TARDIS won't be able to fly!" He told the Doctor.

"I think I know how my own ship works, Jack!" The Doctor defended herself, and pulled out the wire he'd just plugged in.

"Fine," the man said, crossing his arms, "where's the manual?"

The Doctor gaped at him before turning to the many wires under the console, which she started messing with, as she muttered something under breath.

"You're gonna have to speak up, Doc," the man told her.

"I threw it in a supernova!" The Doctor exclaimed, a wire held angrily in her hand.

"You- why?! Why would you do that?!"

"It was stupid! I didn't agree with it!"

"Well, no wonder you don't know how to fix your own ship."

"I _can_ fix her! What do you know, anyway?" Defended the Doctor.

Before the man could make a remark about what he apparently knew, Yaz finally gathered her bearings and coughed loudly to gain their attention. The pair stopped their bickering about how to fix the TARDIS and turned their sights on Ryan and Yaz.

"Ryan! Yaz!" The Doctor exclaimed happily and ran over to them. She pulled them each into a welcoming hug and dragged them over to the console. "Oh, Graham," she suddenly stopped and stared at the man on the floor, "what're you doin' down there?"

"Just thought I'd rest my feet, Doc," he told her, removing his hand from his face. The Doctor nodded slowly at him, clearly disbelieving, before she continued her journey to the man in the World War II coat.

She stopped and let go of Ryan and Yaz's sleeves, positioning them both in front of the man. "Ryan, Yaz, this is an old friend of mine, Captain Jack Harkness," she introduced, "Jack, this is Ryan and Yaz, my new best friends."

Jack held out his hand for Ryan, "nice to meet you," he said with a dazzling smile. Ryan took his hand hesitantly.

"Jack," the Doctor chastised knowingly.

"What?" Jack said, letting go of Ryan's hand. "I'm just saying hello."

"Yeah, well, for you that's flirting."

Jack rolled his eyes and held his hand out for Yaz. Yaz took it with a smile and shook his hand.

"So," Yaz said conversationally when Jack let go of her hand and went to watch what the Doctor was doing with a disapproving stare. "How did you two meet?"

The Doctor stopped tightening a bolt with her spanner and looked up at Jack who also lookes a bit taken aback by the question. Putting the spanner down and straightening up, the Doctor leaned on the console as she prepared to answer the question.

Instead of the Doctor answering, Jack took over with a small grin that was already started to feel familiar to Ryan, Yaz, and Graham.

"Well, it's actually kind of a funny story," Jack started, causing the Doctor to raise an eyebrow.


End file.
